Tuning In: Dan Trant recalled in NBA TV special on 1984 Draft

Thursday

Jun 5, 2014 at 11:04 PMJun 5, 2014 at 11:37 PM

Bill Doyle Tuning In

NBA TV's documentary on the 1984 NBA Draft will obviously focus on Michael Jordan, Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley and John Stockton, Hall of Famers who were selected that year, but the show will also include an emotional segment about the final pick of the '84 draft, former Clark University star Dan Trant.

The Celtics took Trant with the 228th and last pick 30 years ago. Trant never played in the NBA, but he did play professionally in Ireland and in the USBL, leading the Springfield Fame to the league title, before he died tragically in the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center's south tower on Sept. 11, 2001.

Steve Nash will narrate "THE84DRAFT," which is scheduled to premiere at 9 p.m. Monday on NBA TV. Charter does not offer NBA TV, but Xfinity and DirecTV do.

Sean Kelly, senior director of original production for NBA Entertainment, and his crew visited Clark last month to interview Trant's former Clark teammates Lance Faniel and Tyrone Hicks, current Clark coach Paul Phillips, and myself. (Faniel was the only one who actually made it onto the show, but headlines from the T&G during Trant's time at Clark were included.) Wally Halas, Trant's coach at Clark, traveled to Secaucus, New Jersey, to be interviewed.

"People think the last player in the draft is called Mr. Irrelevant," Kelly told the T&G, "but I think we've found out that Dan was anything but that. It's great hearing the stories about him, how they talk about him and the affect he had on their lives. They don't talk in a morbid sense, they talk about happy memories and with smiles and what an influence they had on him."

ESPN analyst and former NBA coach Jeff Van Gundy thanked Kelly for including a story on Trant in the program. Trant had led Clark past Van Gundy's Nazareth College team in the NCAA quarterfinals in 1984. After Trant died, Van Gundy invited Trant's son Dan to serve as a ball boy for a Knicks game.

Faniel knew of Trant in high school when Faniel played for Springfield Tech and Trant played for nearby Westfield High. When Faniel was a freshman at Clark, Halas announced the members of the recruiting class for the following year.

"He mentioned Dan Trant," Faniel recalled in an interview with the T&G, "and I chimed in, 'Oh, he's going to start,' and people looked at me and said, 'No, he's not,' and I said, 'Yes, he is.'"

Trant wasn't scheduled to begin his freshman year as a starter, but Manny Quintela rolled an ankle so Trant took the starting job and he never lost it. Trant became a two-time All-American and led the Cougars to the NCAA Division 3 championship game as a senior.

Quintela ended up being the one who told Trant that the Celtics had drafted him. Trant was having a few beers at Leitrim's Pub with his teammates after playing a game in the Crompton Park basketball league when Quintela barged in and excitedly informed him.

At Worcester Academy, Quintela had been roommates with Rick Carlisle, who was drafted that same night in the third round by the Celtics. Carlisle was the only 1984 draft choice to make the Celtics. He played for the Celtics' NBA championship team in 1986 and coached the Dallas Mavericks to the 2011 NBA title.

Faniel and Trant used to play pickup games in New York City when they were in college. Faniel was 1-½ inches taller and 25 pounds heavier so teams would pick him instead of Trant.

"It didn't bother him," Faniel said. "He waited on the side, got in the next game and won the next five games in a row. He'd have guys at the court calling him little Larry because he just hit six jumpers in a row like Larry Bird. When you saw him, you didn't think, 'Oh, he can play.' But once you saw him actually perform, you recognized that he was an excellent ballplayer."

When Trant reported to the Celtics rookie-free agent camp at Camp Milbrook in Marshfield, he was less than impressed by the rustic conditions. A friend who attended the Nets' camp had stayed at a Marriott and received a uniform and sneakers. Celtics rookies, on the other hand, bunked in the same room with 14 children, ate camp food and wore whatever they brought with them. Trant told the media that Red Auerbach had instructed the rookies as soon as they arrived that Bill Russell and John Havlicek had stayed at the same camp and didn't complain, so he didn't want to hear any complaints from them either.

The night before Trant died, Faniel planned to take him and his two sons to a Red Sox game at Yankee Stadium as a gift for his 40th birthday, but the game was rained out. So they returned to Trant's home on Long Island early. The next morning after the boys went to school and Trant went to work, Faniel had breakfast with Trant's wife Kathy while they flipped through photos of Trant's 40th birthday party.

Then the phone rang. It was Trant calling after the plane had hit the tower where Trant worked on the 103rd floor as a bond trader for Cantor Fitzgerald.

"He was only on for a few seconds," Faniel said, "so they were probably passing a phone around because they recognized it was a situation they may not get out of and they wanted to touch base."

Faniel still wonders what may have happened if the Sox-Yankees game hadn't been rained out. If Trant had arrived home later that night, he might have decided to sleep in and not go to work.

"You wonder if that would have changed fate," Faniel said, "but he spent his last night on earth with his two sons who he was passionate about and a friend that shared the love of basketball with him."

Contact Bill Doyle at wdoyle@telegram.com. Follow him on Twitter @BillDoyle15

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